1.) Dawn, an employee for the Center City Commission, is promoting “Bike to Work Day” on May 21st! She wants the business to be a clearing house for info., find potential committees, and plan fun events that correspond.2.) She also thought of a ‘Walking Tour’ around town in which participants will walk to landmarks, have a scavenger hunt, or any other suggestions.3.) Review and suggestions for elevator statement, mission, and goals.4.) Emily is helping with the Bicycle Film Festival 2010 at the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art.

The draft of the “City of Memphis Bicycle Design Guide ” is up for review until Dec 30 of this year. It is critical that we give our input as this is the document that will be used to guide our future bike facilities Please take a look and let our engineering department know what you think – good and not-so-good.

Also, I think that WalkBike Memphis should complete its own review of the draft (addition to your personal opinions.) This is a prefect first task for the policy committee with a few additional parties who are specifically interested in the guide review. We will talk about this at the end of our meeting to please have a look!

Additionally, attached is the most complete version of the notes from last month. Have a look.

...is a film that we showed today at the Brooks about a North Massachusetts town that was steadily going downhill until it got itself an art museum. This such action totally turned around the city. That's great, right? Well after the film, Elisabeth, my super awesome boss lady, held a Q and A about the film to see what viewers thought. Well she got an earful.Memphians want bike lanes. They also want better transportation and less cars. The movie didn't mention bikes or bike lanes once, but apparently that's the immediate response this audience felt.They made a good point: What's the need for public art if it only works outside of your car, and everyone's in their car? Something to think about.

Okay, so I know most of the people that read this blog ride their bikes religously. However, try as i might, i'm not one of those people. Though recently i have a new found LOVE for riding trails with Cort and speeding through beautifully crafted mud puddles while he looks on with adoration, i want a consistent way to do quicker workouts and still burn calories without building a lot of muscle.

So, i researched the topic and what i found was refreshing and encouraging. I read that riding my trainer (that my amazing bf gave me)at home for 30 minutes will burn up to 235 calories and 500 for an hour! So, yea. Dad, sorry, you can't borrow my trainer anymore. It's super cold and i'm going to try and force myself to ride my short route to work, but just in case i pansy out, i want to know my trainer is there waiting for me.

Oh, and p.s. if any ladies want to walk/run/ride with me in Overton Park so we all feel a little safer, give me a shout.

Here's stuff you need to know:- The start is at the back part of Audubon Park, way back by the fence.- You will exit the park to your left via the gravel road then right on Cherry.- Make your way to the first checkpoint, behind The Peddler on Highland.- Make your way to the intersection of Central and East Parkway, hop on the median and ride that to Poplar.- Enter the park at your discretion, the next checkpoint is Rainbow Lake.- Make your way to McLean and the V&E Greenway, ride that to N. Watkins.- Use the medians to make your way down N. Parkway to Main Street.- Ride between the Trolley tracks (staying on the cobblestones) from N. Main to S. Main, end at Midtown Bikes.

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Right before all of the holiday hysteria we took a little trip, we being Dennis, Erica, Emily and myself, to visit Jevans at his new place in Louisville, KY.

His new apartment is right above a neighborhood bar. The plus is that he lives above a bar, the minus is that he lives above a bar. The other plus is the bar had a simple little bike rack in front; in fact, these bike racks were everywhere around Louisville. Pretty cool. We arrived in Louisville at around 3AM Friday morning and went to bed around 5AM.

We awoke at the crack of 1:30PM. I'm always the first awake so I goofed around outside on my new setup.

I got some new Velocity Chukkers in the Olive Mist color and wrapped them with some 35mm Continental Speed Kings. Riding freewheel on this monster hence the front AND rear brakes. The weather was poifect so we did a small ride to get some food then came back to the house. After that Dennis and Jevans and I rode about 2 miles to downtown to see the shop where Jevans works. Sorry, no pictures, but the major streets had on-street parking which was kind of like having a bike lane. We hung out with the guys at the shop for a few hours then headed to the bar. Notice I didn't say house, because I basically dropped my bag off and went downstairs. The all-vegetarian menu was actually nice and there was quite an assortment of beers. So we had a few.

Neil Young said it's better to burn out than to fade away. That was before Sparks.

At this point I went along with the idea to take a picture with everyone in the bar. Too many to upload so here's a couple:

A couple of people even rode their bikes to the bar:

Fixed gears are the most!

At this point everyone went to sleep except me. I continued to represent Memphis into the wee hours at another bar. I awoke to this:

Dennis is totes in love with me. I can say that because he doesn't read the internet. After doughnuts and coffee and haircuts we spent the day shopping at Zappos, Lotsa Pasta and The World's Most Awesome Flea Market. Again, no pics. So just be satisfied with what you see.